(Necessity for Price Determination)
Conventionally, various products and services have been transacted among enterprises and individuals. Particularly, in recent years, may virtual markets have been opened for electronic transactions along the development of network techniques as represented by the Internet. In these virtual markets, a large number of transactions have been carried out ranging from relatively low-price products like electric products to high-price products like real estates and stocks.
In general, in order to carry out these transactions in fair and properly it is most important to form prices of products and services objectively and rationally, and to maintain balance between demand and supply.
However, in some cases, it is difficult to determine prices of products and services when there is no actual transaction or when the actual transaction volume is small even when there have been actual transactions.
As an example of transaction for which the price determination is difficult, there are unlisted stocks newly issued by a joint-stock corporation.
(Outline of a Stock Price Determination)
Outline of an unlisted stock conventional price determination will be described below.
A joint-stock corporation can raise own funds by issuing stocks. Stocks issued in this way can be broadly classified into unlisted stocks and publicly held stocks according to the modes of transaction.
Of the above, the publicly held stocks are stocks that investors can freely sell and purchase in the stock exchange in each country (such as the Tokyo Stock Exchange and NASDAQ: National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations, etc.) or the stock market like the over-the-counter stock market.
The unlisted stocks are stocks other than the publicly held stocks. The unlisted stocks are important means for medium and small enterprises as represented by venture enterprises to broadly and directly raise their business funds from investors. The transaction amount of unlisted stocks is expected to increase in future, and therefore, early establishment of an objective and rational transaction system has been desired.
When enterprises issue these stocks, it is necessary to set stock prices objectively and rationally in order to achieve fair and smooth transactions as described above.
The stock prices of publicly held stocks are automatically determined based on the supply and demand balance in the stock market, and therefore, there is no problem in this price determination system. However, in the case of the stock prices of unlisted stocks, there is no actual transaction record, and there is no place of price determination at the start. Therefore, it is necessary to determine their stock prices artificially to some extent at the time of issuing the stocks.
Therefore, conventionally, various systems have been utilized for determining stock prices of unlisted stocks. Different systems have been utilized between the case of determining the stock prices of unlisted stocks that are scheduled to be made public very soon, and the case of determining the stock prices of unlisted stocks for which a date of publication has not been decided yet.
(Price Determination for Unlisted Stocks Scheduled to be Made Public Very Soon—Competitive Bidding System)
A price determination system for unlisted stocks scheduled to be made public very soon will be explained first. The competitive bidding system has been employed for this price determination. According to this competitive bidding system, a lowest bid stock price is calculated first. General investors are invited to attend the competitive bid based on this lowest bid stock price that is shown to the investors. A stock price is determined based on a result of this bid.
As the method for determining the lowest bid stock price, a price calculation system based on similar companies is employed. According to this price calculation system based on similar companies, a plurality of enterprises (hereinafter similar enterprises) are selected that are similar to the stock issuing enterprise in type of industry, a form of business, achievement, growth, or scale. The lowest bid stock price is determined by taking into account earning power and net assets of these similar enterprises.
However, according to this competitive bidding system, general investors who have an object of speculation give a large influence to the price formation. Therefore, this system has had a problem in that the stock price is determined irrationally.
Further, the lowest bid stock price is determined based on the scales of the similar enterprises, without taking into account such unique elements as growth possibility and earning power of the issuing company. Therefore, the lowest bid stock price has been irrational in that the price that takes into account the present value of future earning (a future earning discounted present value).
Further, the lowest bid stock price is influenced by the stock prices of the similar enterprises. Therefore, the lowest bid stock price becomes high when the total stock market is in good condition, and the lowest bid stock price becomes low when the total stockmarket is in poor condition, regardless of the actual performance of the similar enterprises. Thus, the lowest bid stock price has been irrational.
(Price Determination for Unlisted Stocks Scheduled to be Made Public Very Soon—Book-Building System)
In order to improve the competitive bidding system having the above problems, there has also been utilized in recent years a price determination system called a book-building system (a demand build-up system). According to this book-building system, first at the time of issuing stocks, opinions of investors who are believed to have high inventive ability in stock prices are obtained. Based on these opinions, a provisional stock price is proposed to investors. Then, investors' demand for the stocks based on this provisional stock price is checked. A stock price is finally determined according to this demand.
According to this book-building system, rationality can be expected to a certain extent. However, at the time of selecting the investors having high inventive ability, a person who selects these investors tends to be arbitrary. For this reason, there is still irrationality in this system.
(Price Determination System for Unlisted Stocks for Which a Date of Publication has not Been Decided Yet—a Negotiation/Consultation System)
Next, there will be explained a price determination system for unlisted stocks for which a date of publication has not been decided yet. A negotiation/consultation system has been employed for this price determination system. According to this system, the stock issuing enterprise determines a stock price based on negotiation/consultation between the issuing enterprise and investors.
However, according to this negotiation/consultation system, it has been said that a power relationship between the issuing enterprise and the investors gives a large influence to a stock price. Specifically, in many cases, a stock issue price of a not-widely-known issuing enterprise has been determined at a low price that is disadvantageous to the issuing enterprise, even when future growth of this issuing enterprise can be expected. This is because the not-widely-known issuing company needs to raise funds from investors of famous leading venture capital. On the other hand, in many cases, a stock issue price of a widely known issuing enterprise has been determined at a high price with an addition of a substantial premium, even when future growth of this issuing enterprise cannot be expected.
As explained above, according to the issue price determination system based on the negotiation/consultation system, the issue price is greatly influenced by the power relationship between the issue enterprise and the investors. Therefore, it has been difficult to rationally determine an issue price. Further, the procurement of fund has been difficult even when the issue enterprise is a promising enterprise with possibility of high future growth.
Further, according to the negotiation/consultation system, there is a limit to the number of investors who can attend the negotiation/consultation. Therefore, it has been difficult to make a large number of investors attend the price formation, so that it has been impossible to achieve a fair expansion of layers of investors.
As is clear from the above explanation, while it is important to determine objectively and rationally a price of unlisted stocks, it is very difficult to determine this price. It is understood from the above that each of the above systems proposed so far has advantages and disadvantages.
Particularly, in recent years, a clear standard of price determination has been desired. Any one of the above systems is insufficient in this point, and therefore, a new price determination system that replaces these conventional systems has been desired.
Furthermore, in the case of executing electronic transactions using a network like the Internet, it is difficult or impossible to carry out an artificial selection or consultation like the conventional system. Therefore, the establishment of a system capable of automatically carrying out this has been strongly desired.
In addition to the above-described conventional systems, there have also been proposed other price determination systems. However, none of these systems is a system adaptable to a mode of transaction in which an instant decision is obtained based on the participation of a large number of investors like the above electronic transactions. Therefore, a new useful system that satisfies these requirements has been desired.
These problems occur not only in the unlisted stocks, but similarly occur in all transactions of products and services of which actual transaction volume is small.
The present invention has been made in the light of the above problems. It is an object of the present invention to provide a method of and apparatus for processing transaction information, a terminal unit for performing transaction, and a recording medium capable of achieving transactions based on an objective and rational determination of transaction prices of products and services that have no past transaction record like unlisted stocks.